To wonder if anyone goes hitchhiking anymore?

[Chinsupmeloves]

As females me and my friends used to this a lot, mostly in pairs, but also did it alone sometimes during daylight. I rarely see anyone hitching now, not even in the usual places where there would quite a few and we wished each other luck!

Our parents didn't really know, well sometimes, but not much they could do about it until we reached our destination and rang from a pay phone to say we were safe. Looking back I of course realise how awful this was for them but for me it was just exciting while travelling across many different countries.

Now, even with the protection of mobile phones and trackers, I would be apprehensive of my DC did this and with online everything we book and pay for tickets for them. In the 1980s/90s they may well have given you the money but you decided to hitch and spend it on ither things!

So, any old hitchers out there who would like to share? I know many did as means to get from A to B after work, not always a lifestyle choice. Xx

Highway of Tears BC Canada more than 80 missing presumed murdered women and children…
Personally sexually assaulted twice when forced to hitchhike in the 70’s.
Hugely unsafe

I hitchhiked in Nice when I was staying there in the 90s. My room mate suggested it and off we went. From the suburbs into the centre of Nice. Got a lift with some nice lads.

would I want my own kids to hitchhike now - absolutely not!!!
nor would I want them to pick up hitchhikers.

I was a child in the 80's and 90's and hitch hiking was very much frowned upon.

I remember as a child being in the car with my parents and on a rare occasion seeing someone, always a bloke, stood at the side of the road hitch hiking.

My parents thought they were mad and the dangers of such were drilled into us. I haven't seen any since those times.

However, I have worked with colleagues who were a good 30 years older than me who told me of stories of when they were young HH's.

I did it whilst backpacking in my 20s (late 1990s), in NZ mainly. It wasn't long after the terrible hitchhiker murders in Australia, but apparently we weren't worried about doing it in NZ! I was always with a friend, and we usually only went with women drivers. I've picked up female hitchhikers at home in Scotland, where some of the routes are more remote, and a lack of public transport. Often in a coffee shop/local pub, where I've said I'd take someone to the next village, or the like. Again, I am never alone with someone in the car, as a driver or passenger.
If my mother knew what I was up to on the other side of the world, she would have been horrified!!

Yes, it’s called Uber now. Still getting in random cars and hoping for the best.

I'm in my early 60s, grew up in northern England, and it was drummed into me early on that hitchhiking wasn't safe, so I never did it.

My SILs, who are the same age as me, grew up in rural Ireland and hitchhiked regularly. I must admit to being horrified when I heard that to them it was normal and just something you did to save money. Needless to say, they'd all discourage their own daughters from doing it now.

I hitched a lot as a teen and into my 20s in the 1980s/1990s...sometimes to work where no public transport... Other times just for fun.... When I either didn't have a car/license or no money!

The vast vast majority were absolutely fine, lots were fun too... Interesting people, wanting map reading /company on long journeys or who just wanted to help.

I rarely travelled with single blokes... I nearly always hitched with someone... But inevitably it slowed down your travelling speed.... As obvs drivers often don't want to risk 2 hitches!

Had lots of pals who hitched...

I must have had 100s of lifts... Only a few were alarming...

The car that caught fire on the M1 after midnight...

The bloke who stopped in a town... Supposedly to pick up a takeaway coffee and returned to say he'd booked us into a hotel for afternoon fun... Nope!

A midday lift in a town, a bloke who tried to grope me... I jumped out at traffic lights.

Of all my female pals who hitched most had had similar levels of unpleasantness.... The wanking lorry driver that a friend encountered was pretty grim.

By far the worse was a male friend was raped by a Scandinavian lorry driver.

This was a tiny number of horrid incidents over several thousand lifts between all of us.

I wouldn't say I hitch hiked perse, but I got lifts from strangers (who offered) when I was waiting for public transport. Writing this down I can see there's little difference between the two tbh.

Sometimes I was with a couple of friends. A couple of times it was on my own. It was always to get home, as opposed to anywhere else. Someone it was at a party, just looking for a free ride home from another party goer.

The older wiser me, who is so crime conscious, can as this was insane and I could have been taped or killed.

After one chap dropped me home and proceeded to ask for a sexual favour, I decided I wouldn't be doing that again. I wasn't even scared at the time, just annoyed tbh. He obviously thought he was on a promise.

I would be mortified if my kids did what I did. Luckily, I know they wouldn't. I've drilled my health and safety, crime awareness into them from a young age.